"As ProPublica reported, state police and National Guardsmen mostly stood aside and watched as the violence grew worse.

This appears to be a direct result of what appears to be a stand down order from higher-ups.

When the alt-right rally was mostly dispersed, police still seemed a missing presence in the city as the leftists kept demonstrating, some armed with aluminum bats and other weapons. This is the scene where the white nationalist drove his car through pedestrians, with police seemingly far away from the action.

That absence allowed for a female reporter who was an eyewitness to the intentional crash to be allegedly punched in the face by antifa. The reason: because she was press.

Curiously, this attack on a journalist hasn’t netted much attention.

The chaos seems like it could have been contained and fewer people hurt if police were a more active presence in Charlottesville.

Both sides of the rally have been critical of police inaction in the rally, putting blame on them for the out-of-control violence that occurred on Sunday."

"Stories Claiming DNC Hack Was 'Inside Job' Rely Heavily On A Stupid Conversion Error No 'Forensic Expert' Would Make". The author is so oddly certain of himself and nasty to a large collection of real experts that I can only conclude Techdirt is just another dirt Clintonista front, and perhaps a dirt IC front. See the comment by Richard Hack. Scott Ritter has questions too, but is a lot more open minded.

"Why Was This 'Crowd Hire' Company Recruiting $25 An Hour 'Political Activists' In Charlotte Last Week?" Not this again! Crisis actors and paid provocateurs!

"KKK leader seeking Charlottesville rally has history as FBI informant":

"According to the Times Union in Albany, New York, Barker wore a wire and secretly recorded a conversation with Glendon Scott Crawford, a Klan member who was trying to gain support for his “mobile death ray,” which he’d hoped to use on Muslims."

and:

"Barker’s
checkered history was noted by Jason Kessler, the right-wing blogger
and founder of Unity and Security for America. Six days after Barker’s
Klan group submitted its application, Kessler submitted his own
application for an assembly in Lee Park, set to run from 12 to 5 p.m.
Aug. 12.

In an email, Kessler
called Barker “an FBI informant and multiple felon” and claimed that he
was “being paid by left-wing groups to discredit legitimate
conservatives.”

“Someone is trying to discredit my rally by bringing in this jackass,” Kessler wrote."

"'Unite the Right' organizer Jason Kessler ousted as provocateur Obama supporter from Occupy movement". "Unite the Right Protesters Hoodwinked by their Own Leader".

"Kessler started his blog “Jason Kessler, American Author,” toward the
end of 2015 and spent the majority of the next year dispensing mindset
and lifestyle advice and promoting two books authored during a period of
“worldwide travel.” The first is a book of poetry titled Midnight Road, and a second novel called Badland Blues about a “drunken dwarf,” who is “unlucky in love, looks or money.”
Rumors abound on white nationalist forums that Kessler’s ideological
pedigree before 2016 was less than pure and seem to point to involvement
in the Occupy movement and past support for President Obama.
At one recent speech in favor of Charlottesville’s status as a
sanctuary city, Kessler live-streamed himself as an attendee questioned
him and apologized for an undisclosed spat during Kessler’s apparent
involvement with Occupy. Kessler appeared visibly perturbed by the
woman’s presence and reminders of their past association."

This is amazingly over-the-top bat-shit crazy, an indication that this is where the Clintonistas are going to take their stand (see also "Bushes, Obama, Clinton weigh in on Charlottesville"): "The House Is On Fire – Accepting the Truth of the Trump Revolution" (read down to "Copernican vs Ptolemaic models of the solar system"!!!):

"This is Trump, a man whose deepest political impulses are tied to racial grievance and a desire for revenge, a desire to place the deserving and white back at the top of the racial hierarchy. People get caught up on whether or not people are willing to call Trump a ‘racist’. Of course, he’s a racist. But that doesn’t tell us enough. Lots of people dislike blacks or Jews, don’t want to live near them, etc. But many, likely most with racist attitudes, do not embrace a politics driven by racial grievance. Trump’s politics are about racial grievance. It’s not latent or peripheral but rather central. That’s different and it’s worse. It is one of the few consistent themes in his politics going back many, many years."

"Cloudflare CEO on Terminating Service to Neo-Nazi Site: 'The Daily Stormer Are Assholes'" (also). The simultaneous big corporate attack on The Daily Stormer is extremely interesting, as it brings two issues to light. First, all these companies are engaged in supplying services of public necessity, are effectively monopolies, and should be nationalized, or at least heavily regulated as public utilities. Whatever you think of The Daily Stormer or the decision, having 0.1%-ers unilaterally decide what you can read is obviously wrong and dangerous. This is what real fascism looks like. Secondly, driving The Daily Stormer to the dark web is a curious decision, as the business model of all these companies consists in harvesting our internet data, and if enough of us start using, say, Tor (where you only give your data to the CIA!), and fall outside their grasp, they are going to have big problems.

"Californian Who Helped Lead Charlottesville Protests Used Berkeley as a Test Run":

"He would serve two deployments in Iraq in the infantry. It was on these tours that Damigo’s views on race began to be shaped by the violent conflict he saw on a daily basis — killings, murders, explosions and misery.

“I saw them in Iraq, which is also a multireligious, multicultural society,” Damigo said. “And I generally saw it growing up. And it was certainly a more extreme form, but it definitely, I think, it did make me think a bit more about race and population dynamics.”

The violence that began to shape Damigo’s thinking on race also killed two of his close friends in combat. According to court documents obtained by El Tecolote and KQED, Damigo began suffering acute symptoms of PTSD as a result of his exposure to the Iraq War.

Damigo blames that trauma for his decision to rob a San Diego cab driver at gunpoint after his return from Iraq.

During a psychological evaluation conducted for the court as part of the criminal case, Damigo said he attacked the cab driver, Changiz Ezzatyar, because he mistook him for an Iraqi. Damigo said the decision came after a night of solitary heavy drinking."

When the Maiden comes to America (color revolution blowback): "The Story of Charlottesville was Written in Blood in the Ukraine" (Baraka):

"What is the character of racist right-wing politics today? Is it the crazed white supremacist who plows into an anti-fascist demonstration in Charlottesville, VA or can it also be the assurance by Lindsay Graham that an attack against North Korea would result in thousands of lives lost…. but those lives will be “over there”? What about the recent unanimous resolution by both houses of Congress in support of Israel and criticism of the United Nations for its alleged anti-Israeli bias? Would that qualify as racist and right-wing, since it appears that the ongoing suffering of the Palestinians is of no concern? And what about the vote by the U.S. House of Representatives to go even beyond the obscene proposal of the Trump administration to increase the military budget by $54 billion dollars and instead add a whopping $74 billion to the Pentagon budget?

What I find interesting about the current discussion around what many are referring to as the emboldening of the radical white supremacist right is how easy it is to mobilize opposition against the crude and overt white supremacists we saw in Charlottesville. So easy, in fact, that it’s really a distraction from the more difficult and dangerous work that needs to be done to confront the real right-wing power brokers.

The white supremacy that some of us see as more insidious is not reflected in the simple, stereotypical images of the angry, Nazi-saluting alt-righter or even Donald Trump. Instead, it is the normalized and thus invisible white supremacist ideology inculcated into cultural and educational institutions and the policies that stem from those ideas. That process doesn’t just produce the storm troopers of the armed and crazed radical right but also such covert true believers as Robert Ruben from Goldman Sachs, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Tony Blair and Nancy Pelosi – “decent” individuals who have never questioned for a moment the superiority of Western civilization, who believe completely in the White West’s right and responsibility to determine which nations should have sovereignty and who should be the leaders of “lesser” nations. And who believe that there is no alternative to the wonders of global capitalism even if it means that billions of human beings are consigned permanently to what Fanon called the “zone of non-being.”"

"But for those of us who are NOT sophists and understand Nazism as Germany’s particular expression of fascism, we recognize that there is a seamless continuity between Bush, Clinton, Baby Bush, Obama and the White House’s current occupant.

Was Obama’s failure to prosecute a single police officer for the murders of black and brown people that occurred on his watch some kind of testament to liberal democracy?

That wasn’t Obama who showered billions of dollars on the very bankers who defrauded black Americans of more wealth than at any time since the emancipation proclamation? Who declared the Palestinians “un-people” and campaigned aggressively against their sovereignty at the UN? Allowed Baby Doc to run for president but not Aristide? Installed, LITERALLY, Nazis as the rulers of Ukraine?

As for Trump’s singular moral failings, was it Trump who was told by his own state department that if he sold skin-melting white phosphorous to Saudi Arabia, they would use it on Yemeni women and children, and responded by saying, in effect; “And your point?”

Or what about that amusing little war he started in Africa’s most prosperous country at the behest of Goldman Sachs, in which “white” Africans lynched “black” Africans from light poles, like rednecks in the Jim Crow South?"

These un-rare moments when American liberals are particularly full of themselves, confident in their moral superiority, and comfortable in their exceptionalist skins are particularly enlightening (the classic still being 'We came, we saw, he died' Killary's 'Deplorables' speech). It is all part of The Clarification.

"Charlottesville has many aspects that are ignored by NPR and the rest of the presstitutes. For example, how does the Bush/Cheney/Obama/neoconservative assertion that Americans are the “exceptional people” whose country is the “indispensable country” differ from Trump’s proclamation of “America first”? No one among the liberal/progressive/left was disturbed when Obama proclaimed to the world that Americans are the exceptional, indispensable people. Doesn’t Obama use much clearer language that puts America first? If Americans are exceptional, everyone else is unexceptional. If Americans are indispensable, everyone else is dispensable."

Note how Lang's way of thinking here is a particularly vile example of American assumptions, this time from the 'realist right': "Guam rejoices!". The problem is bipartisan and extremely deep-seated.

Curious how Charlottesville is just an American Exceptionalist sideshow, while at the exact same time the rest of the world digs itself out from the effects of American Exceptionalism: "Hezbollah and Syrian Army Finishing off Terrorists of Al-Nusra". "What’s Really Happening in #Venezuela – From Someone Who Knows". "Turkey Reversing on Syria – Will End of Support for Syrian Rebels as ‘Goodwill Towards Damascus’" (wow!). "Oh, the US Department of State's Annual Report on Religious Freedom found this evidence of anti-Semitism in Syria"! "Yes, Syrian refugees can return to Aleppo… and do so in their 100,000s". "Recolonization Rears Its Ugly Head" (Madsen).

"How War Pollutes the Potomac River" (Swanson). Funny how you almost never see this most obvious point: "War Not Only Kills People: It’s the Single Biggest Destroyer of the Environment".

"Leaked Emails: Saudi Power Behind the Throne “Wants Out of Yemen”". Note all the sleazy players involved in this 'leak'!

"Is
this the beginning of the end for Canada’s Rebel Media?: Tim Harper". I
have to note that the following two pieces are Onion-style satire: "Ezra Levant confident riled up, far-right mob won’t turn against Jews this time" (prescient!) and "After
years of race-baiting rhetoric and Islamophobia, I was beginning to
suspect the Rebel might be racist" (inspired, perhaps, by the classic from pre-Haim days).

Tuesday, August 15, 2017

"Alex Jones Says Charlottesville ‘Looks Staged,’ Recalls Jews Posing As Nazis". Never forget that there wasn't an extreme right in Canada until Canadian government spooks arranged and paid for it: "Decades later, CSIS’s white supremacy infiltrator tells his story". If you are not deeply suspicious you are a moron.

"Fake @Guardian site with ('ı' exchange for 'i') runs story about Putin defeating MI6 and CIA plot to fragment Russia"

"Mystery of Cuban harassment case: Why did device deafen but not bring on nausea?" This story makes no sense - the Cubans have no desire to pick a fight with Trump, and are friendly with Canadian diplomats. Probably a virus.

"Steve Bannon Said He Learned To Fear Muslims When He Visited Pakistan. Except He Was Probably In Hong Kong." Whatever else Bannon may be he is not an idiot, so the more likely scenario is that he just made the whole thing up to justify an otherwise inexplicable Islamophobia.

"Mossad chief to visit Washington to give security briefing on Syria". I like to see the stark truth come out. Yinon 1 having failed, let's go for Yinon 2: "Netanyahu to Congressmen: Kurds should have a state".

"Liberating Europe from Russian Gas" (Leupp) (my emphasis in red; it is rare to see them misuse their propaganda bluster quite so blatantly):

"The concept, as articulated by Sen. John McCain and Sen. John Hoeven in a 2014 Wall Street Journal op-ed, is to “liberate our allies from Russia’s stranglehold on the European natural-gas market.” But as the Washington Post has observed, “The problem is that Europeans don’t necessarily want to be liberated. Russian gas is much cheaper than American LNG, and could become even cheaper to undercut the United States if it entered the European market. American LNG suppliers prioritize their own profits over America’s strategic advantage anyway, and are likely to want to target more lucrative markets than Europe, such as Japan. Finally, the Russian gas supply is likely to be more reliable than the United States’, since it involves predictable long-term contracts, whereas U.S. production capacity rises and falls, as it becomes cheaper and more expensive to extract American unconventional hydrocarbons.”

The McCain-Hoeven piece was of course written before there was any talk about Russian “election meddling.” But that issue was used to justify the sanctions bill. That, plus miscellaneous Russian actions, basically in response to U.S. actions (as in Ukraine, where—as everyone should know—Hillary Clinton’s crony Victoria Newland helped organize a putsch in February 2014, designed to pull Ukraine into NATO, although that effort has failed and anyway lacks German support)."

Monday, August 14, 2017

"The Misguided Attacks on ACLU for Defending Neo-Nazis’ Free Speech Rights in Charlottesville" (Greenwald). I suspect as lot of the grumbling is really about the ACLU's resistance to AIPAC's million buck fine and years in prison for lèse-majesté.

"In a different world, Venezuela might not face this kind of choice. In a different world, the international community might be willing to help Venezuela diversify its economy without making it accept a massive decline in living standards for its poor and working people. But we don’t have the international institutions to live in that world. Most of the time, we leave countries more or less on their own, offering help only if those countries agree to adopt an economic system focused around pleasing international investors. If they’re not willing to do that, we’re willing to let their people starve to death. It’s a cruel system."

Assange tweets on the backfiring of the liberal identity politics electoral math.

On interference in foreign governments, the big moral outrage in Washington: "The Pentagon Has a Small Coup Problem" (Turse). Also: "Charlottesville: What You Wish Upon Others, You Wish Upon Yourself" (Moon).

Sunday, August 13, 2017

Theory: from the memo that got Rich Higgins fired: "POTUS & POLITICAL WARFARE" (with the removal of the Islamic stuff, and a lot of editing, this wouldn't sound so addled):

"This is not politics as usual but rather political warfare at an unprecedented level that is openly engaged
in the direct targeting of a seated president through manipulation of the news cycle. It must be
recognized on its own terms so that immediate action can be taken. At its core, these campaigns run on
multiple lines of effort, serve as the non-violent line of effort of a wider movement, and execute political
warfare agendas that reflect cultural Marxist outcomes. The campaigns operate through narratives.
Because the hard left is aligned with lslamist organizations at local (ANTI FA working with Muslim
Brotherhood doing business as MSA and CAIR), national (ACLU and BLM working with CAIR and MPAC)
and international levels (OIC working with OSCE and the UN), recognition must given to the fact that
they seamlessly interoperate at the narrative level as well. In candidate Trump, the opposition saw a
threat to the "politically correct" enforcement narratives they've meticulously laid in over the past few
decades. In President Trump, they see a latent threat to continue that effort to ruinous effect and theirretaliatory response reflects this fear."

and:

"As used here, "political warfare" does not concern activities
associated with the American political process but rather exclusively refers to political warfare as
understood by the Maoist Insurgency model. 2 Political warfare is one of the five components of a Maoist
insurgency. Maoist methodologies employ synchronized violent and non-violent actions that focus on
mobilization of individuals and groups to action. This approach envisions the direct use of non-violent
operational arts and tactics as elements of combat power. In Maoist insurgencies, the formation of a
counter-state is essential to seizing state power. Functioning as a hostile competing state acting within
an existing state, it has an alternate infrastructure. Political warfare operates as one of the activities of
the "counter-state" and is primarily focused on the resourcing and mobilization of the counter state or
the exhaustion and demobilization of the targeted political movement. Political warfare methods can
be implemented at strategic, operational, or tactical levels of operation.
Political warfare is warfare. Strategic information campaigns designed to delegitimize through
disinformation arise out of non-violent lines of effort in political warfare regimes. They principally
operate through narratives. Because the left is aligned with lslamist organizations at local, national and
international levels, recognition should be given to the fact that they seamlessly interoperate through
coordinated synchronized interactive narratives. "

and (my emphasis in red):

"That post-modern (diversity/multiculturalism) narratives seeks to implement cultural Marxist objectives
can be demonstrated by reference to founding Frankfurt School theorist Herbert Marcuse's repurposing
of the term tolerance. In a 1965 paper Marcuse defined tolerance as intolerance; said it can be
implemented through undemocratic means to stop chauvinism (xenophobia), racism, discrimination;
and should be extended to the left while denied to the right . . . ."

and:

"As cultural Marxist narratives intensify, they are to be further operationalized in the form of hate speech
narratives. Hate speech narratives are non-random, coordinated, and fully interoperable escalations of
cultural Marxist memes. Key international players include the European Union, the UN, and the OSCE,
the OIC and the International Muslim Brotherhood. Hate speech memes are structured, coordinated,
and implemented through these same international forums. They involve close coordination with media
and social media and include the Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) narratives."

"Of note, “Unite the Right” held a rally which was legally organized with a permit from the city, as it is their first amendment right to do so, and Antifa showed up with cement-filled cans and other weapons with plans to violently protest the event – creating a dangerous atmosphere police did nothing to control.

The ACLU confirmed that Charlottesville police were ordered to stand down, which allowed the KKK and Antifa to meet face to face with no interference."

and:

"Some have suggested that the violent atmosphere and lack of police presence was a factor in the decision and ability of 20 year old white supremacist James Alex Fields to drive his 2010 Dodge Challenger into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing 32 year old paralegal Heather Heyer and injuring dozens of others."

So:

legal right-wing rally, called 'hate speech' by media;

Antifa shows up with weapons and ready for a fight;

police disappear;

violence occurs, which the media blames on the 'hate speech' rally attendees, and, by extension, on Trump.

Somebody named George is hard at work on a new textbook of practical revolutionary politics.

Had the murder not occurred in Charlottesville, the white nationalists would have been able to depict the weekend as a great victory for their ideology, the only issue being that the authorities attempted to deprive them of their constitutional rights. As it is, the weekend was a big victory for Soros and his crew. So, who talked the moron - another three-named 'Jr' - into his car stunt? Just what good for his cause did he think could come of this?

"The Russia-Did-It Certitude Challenged". Interview with Craig Murray on various subjects.

"Has Narenda Modi Switched Sides?" (Engdahl). Modi went destructively anti-Indian right after he met with Bibi! Sounds like India will be the fodder for another proxy war:

"Has Narenda Modi actually switched sides from a genuine supporter of peaceful resolution of Indo-Pakistani and Indo-Chinese border disputes in a spirit of good-willed collaboration within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, or was he Janus-faced in terms of his allegiances from the 2014 onset of his tenure as prime Minister, a kind of Anglo-American-Israeli Trojan Horse sent to sabotage China’s promotion of the Eurasian new Economic Silk Road? The answer is not yet known at least not by this author. However, a well-placed Indian source with close ties to the Indian military forces noted to me in a recent private correspondence that shortly following Trump’s election in November last year, a senior US intelligence adviser to the Trump circles stated bluntly that there would not be a war between USA and China, but rather there would be a war between India and China across the Himalayas. That was in November at a time Doklam was completely quiet."

"A war in the Himalayas would expose India’s soft power" (Bhadrakumar).

"Facing Defeat in Syria, ISIS Inexplicably Expands Globally" (Cartalucci). The world-wide American proxy army, which turns up whenever and wherever American interests need a helping hand, exists on some kind of mysterious funding which is 'inexplicable'.

"Destroying the Islamic State group could create a ‘radical Iranian empire,’ warns Henry Kissinger". The mask slips . . .

"Bring Me the Head of Jeff Bezos" (Shamir). "I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon". Note how this clever scam could happen to anybody who buys from a third-party vendor on Amazon, and Jeff won't help you once you are defrauded.

"UN Human Rights Body Makes an Outlandish Statement on Venezuela". I've noticed that the UN is particularly vile in its lies these days. There is a very HRW-type of stench to its selective outrage.

"What’s Left of the Bolivarian Revolution?" "Why Venezuela needs our solidarity". I still think that the approach to Venezuela today is the definitive test of whether you are dealing with a real progressive, or a poseur posing as 'left' to promote the usual right-wing agenda.

"Fire McMaster, Urges Pro-Israel Group Backed by Sheldon Adelson". "Netanyahu's Billionaire Backer May Help Bring Him Down". Sheldon seems to be having a tough time as the respective pragmatists circle the wagons.

"Was Sergey Brin's Ex-Sister-In-Law the Driving Force in Getting James Damore Canned?" Of all the major companies in the world, Google has the most peculiar attitude to 'free speech', having to pretend to be all for it while actually being entirely, and actively, against it. So the firing decision fits their business model to a tee, while being overly clumsy and obvious. Damore is smart enough to know this would happen, so I'm thinking this was a ploy to get a new, much better, job from some Silicon Valley bro-billionaire who likes the way he thinks, plus a big settlement from Google to make this all go away. We're starting to see how Google is going to self-destruct.

Defense of Damore by the Ur-snowflake: "Why Google was wrong: Did James Damore really deserve to be fired for what he wrote?" I did not see that coming! It emphasizes the cleverness with which the memo was written. It is a 'trigger' with no bullet in the chamber.

We can never forget that people like Lang are, fundamentally, insane American Exceptionalists, a trait that The Clarification has demonstrated he shares with almost everybody on the American 'Left', including much of the alt-Left. It appears Lang has taken his ball home again, not caring for the insolence of the punk-ass commentators, who he wants off his lawn.

"Saudi Arabia's Orwellian "Development Plans" For The Shia Town It Just Flattened". "Saudi Arabia Is Trying to Remake the Middle East In Its Image".

Kirsten Gillibrand is tortured to death for apostasy, and you can hear her screams. "The Israeli Mossad, George Ratterman, and John F. Kennedy" (Alexis).

"The Kurdish Connection: Israel, ISIS And U.S. Efforts To Destabilize Iran". "The Kurds: Washington’s Weapon Of Mass Destabilization In The Middle East". This is Iranian propaganda, but there is quite a bit of truth in it. There are strong contradictions in Kurdish nationalism, largely directed through Zionist influence. The good news is that the Turks are going to force the Syrian Kurds to choose wisely.

"CALM DOWN: We're not even close to nuclear war with North Korea". We're still in the sweet spot where angry rhetoric serves all sides better than war.

"The Real Reason Washington is Worried about North Korea". The deterrence of being able to strike back against an illegal American attack, something that Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, etc., etc., etc., all, sadly, lacked. Escobar: "Pyongyang’s nuclear arsenal represents the deterrent against regime change that Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi could not count on."

"Krieger Asks: Is Google A Search Engine Or 'Deep State' Organ?". From Assange's book. The oddly quick firing of Damore is pure identity-politics virtue signalling that it remains firmly in the neoliberal camp.

"#FireMcMaster, explained". This is odd: "Fire McMaster" (Raimondo). "An NSC Staffer Is Forced Out Over a Controversial Memo". "Ex-Breitbart staffer booted from National Security Council as far-right nationalists lose influence". Contradictions within both Zionism and Bannonism are being clarified by Trumpism.

"These two developments are part of a larger battle between McMaster and Bannon, who fundamentally disagree on a number of key issues, including at least two with a direct connection to Israel: the re-location of the American embassy to Jerusalem (Bannon supported the idea, McMaster and the NSC warned against it), and the Iran nuclear deal, which Bannon and his supporters pushed the president to scrap, against the advice of McMaster and other senior administration officials who urged Trump to keep it. For the time being, McMaster has won both battles."

The main contradictions of Bannonism (which perhaps should be called Mercerism), which will keep popping up, are that 1) Bannon pretends to be a MAGA isolationist while maintaining a warmongering attitude towards both China and Iran (but not Russia as it is thought to be a 'white'/Christian outpost of civilization), and 2) his extreme anti-immigration stance, which could be MAGA (in a twisted way), is tainted with a strong irrational Islamophobia which comes right out of the extremes of the alt-right, and of course is fostered with considerable effort and money by Zionists like Gaffney.

"What We Talk About When We Talk About Gorka". The contradictions are moving The Tablet in some hilarious directions. See also, the e-x-t-r-e-m-e-l-y clarifying: "Is the ACLU Still Committed to Free Speech?".

"Secretive search for man behind Trump dossier reveals tension in Russia inquiry". This represents part of the potential backfire on the Clintonistas of Russiagate, leading directly to discussion of Ukrainian efforts to influence the American election result. See: "Watchdog Files Complaint Against DNC For Colluding With Ukraine During The Election".

"German Bombshell Bestseller Exposing CIA Media Control Blocked in US". Ulfkotte's name keeps popping up, just below the radar. It is useful to have a reasonable explanation for why the German government seems so hell bent on policies against the interests of the German people.

Thursday, August 10, 2017

"A New Report Raises Big Questions About Last Year’s DNC Hack". No Hersh, but the first breakthrough in the massive wall built by the mainstream media around the truth of the 'Russian hack' based on the technical analysis of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, which is itself based on the work of Forensicator and Adam Carter. The comments are good at rebutting various pathetic Clintonista attempts at obfuscation, particularly by intentionally confusing units of measurement. The comment by Charlie Price is hilarious, if sadly true:

"Kudos to Mr. Lawrence, but also to the Ms. vanden Heuvel and everyone else at The Nation who cleared this article for publication. This took guts."

The collapse of the Russian interference narrative is coupled with the fact that the Democrats have their own problems, particularly their connections to Ukrainian foreign influence, and whatever the hell DWS was up to the the Awan family, meaning I think we'll see Russiagate fade into the background to be replaced with Mueller trying to use possible financial improprieties of Manafort and (perhaps) Flynn, to get them to turn on Trump and reveal possible financial shenanigans of Trump involving Russians. I suspect this will go on for years and never get anywhere.

Wednesday, August 09, 2017

As long as the North Koreans keep up with their provocations, the Americans will continue to look to the Chinese to solve the problem, and Trump will back down on his threats of trade sanctions on China as China provides the only hope of a Korean settlement. As long as they dither, the Chinese avoid American trade sanctions.

The only route to a possible settlement that the North Koreans can live with is to continue to provide some reason for the Americans to want to settle, which encourages more provocations to provide an incentive to pay attention to the issue. The new sanctions are stringent enough that they will encourage further North Korean acts to gain attention, as attention is the only possible path to getting the negotiated deal they want.

The North Koreans, and the rest of the world, remember that Gadaffi gave up his nukes, and got a bayonet up the ass from the neocons for his troubles, with his country laid waste. The lesson learned from the neocons - not to mention the horrors the American inflicted on Korea during the Korean War - is that you can never, in any circumstances, give up your nukes. 'We came, we saw, he died' (and note the horror-movie cackle). Killary would have already started WWIII over this, no question, so the phony alarm of the Clintonistas to Trump's rhetorical flourishes is disgusting. Americans are never going to get a negotiated deal anywhere now if part of it is giving up nukes.

Essentially, the Americans have set the incentives up in this case completely backwards, encouraging brinkmanship and chaos.

"‘The Palestine Exception’: War on BDS is now a war on American democracy" (Baroud). "Is this the revival of the blacklist in Nassau?":

"Is Nassau County ready to return to the days when entertainers were punished because of their political beliefs?

The blacklisting of actors, writers and directors during the Cold War is among the most shameful chapters of American history. People who refused to tell the House Un-American Activities Committee whether they had ever been members of the Communist Party lost their jobs and were unable to find work. Some even committed suicide.

Yet a group of Nassau County lawmakers appears to favor a revival of a blacklist. They are determined to prevent former Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters from performing at Nassau Coliseum next month because he has endorsed the goals of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement. BDS seeks to punish Israel because of its policies toward Palestinians."

"I was contacted a few months ago by representatives of David Berlinski, who is often billed as a renegade, independent thinker, a skeptic who resists all schools of thought, the last of the true free-thinkers. As far as I can make out, he is a paid agent of the Discovery Institute, that powerful association of American Christian fundamentalists set on deepening our country's great cultural divide by sowing the seeds of doubt about evolutionary theory and forcing public schools, as a first step, to 'teach both sides'. Richard Dawkins has cited Berlinski as the only public figure railing against Darwin who is not ignorant, stupid, or insane; Berlinski is rather, Dawkins maintains, simply wicked. The Discovery people seem to like him because he is a self-described secular Jew and a scientist and a bon-vivant expat in Paris, and has come to his skepticism about Darwinian orthodoxy as a result of nothing other than rational inquiry. This lends them a respectability that 10,000 evangelical know-nothings could not deliver, whatever credentials Oral Roberts may have bestowed on them. Anyhow, I ended up having an indescribably weird lunch with him and some of his associates from Inference, the new journal he is spearheading, apparently with Discovery Institute money. Discretion requires me to leave out the details of the conversation, but I will say that I was stunned at several moments by the crassness and cynicism on display. He let me know that he would like for me to get involved in the editorial operation behind the journal, and he also let me know that to do so could potentially be very lucrative for me. This was the last time I spoke with him, though I did send him a message telling him that everything I think and write presupposes human-animal kinship, and I cannot be associated with anything even remotely connected to that sinister institute in Seattle."

"Among the Russian social media speculation on Monday were suggestions that the split was fueled by Western sanctions against Russia. High-level Russian officials have reportedly been divorcing their wives in recent years and by some accounts transferring assets to them as a way to protect their fortunes against potential seizure."

"The Tale of the Brothers Awan" (Giraldi) (some of the links don't work):

"As Imran Awan reportedly had access to Wasserman-Schultz’s iPad, he presumably also was able to see the incriminating Hillary Clinton emails. He used a laptop in her office as well that was, according to investigators, concealed in an “unused crevice” in the Rayburn House Office Building. It is currently being examined by police but Wasserman-Schultz tried strenuously to recover it before it could be looked at. She pressured the Chief of the Capitol Police Matthew Verderosa to return it, threatening him by saying “you should expect that there will be consequences.” Initially Wasserman-Schultz refused to cooperate with the police, refusing to provide her passwords and not permitting them to open her computers, but Fox News reports that she has recently apparently allowed the authorities to do a scan.

There is another odd connection of Imran Awan that goes back to the neocon circle around Paul Wolfowitz during the Iraq War. In late 2002 and early 2003, Wolfowitz regularly met secretly with a group of Iraqi expatriates who resided in the Washington area and were opponents of the Saddam Hussein regime. The Iraqis had not been in their country of birth for many years but they claimed to have regular contact with well-informed family members and political allies. The Iraqi advisers provided Wolfowitz with a now-familiar refrain, i.e. that the Iraqi people would rise up to support invading Americans and overthrow the hated Saddam. They would greet their liberators with bouquets of flowers and shouts of joy.

The Iraqis were headed by one Dr. Ali A. al-Attar, born in Baghdad to Iranian parents in 1963, a 1989 graduate of the American University of Beirut Faculty of Medicine. He subsequently emigrated to the United States and set up a practice in internal medicine in Greenbelt Maryland, a suburb of Washington D.C. Al-Attar eventually expanded his business to include nine practices that he wholly or partly owned in Virginia and Maryland but he eventually lost his license due to “questionable billing practices” as well as “unprofessional conduct” due to having sex with patients

Al-Attar was investigated by the FBI and eventually indicted for large scale health care fraud in 2008-9, which included charging insurance companies more than $2.3 million for services their patients did not actually receive with many of the false claims using names of diplomats and employees enrolled in a group plan at the Egyptian Embassy in Washington. In one case, the doctors claimed an embassy employee visited three of their clinics every 26 days between May 2007 and August 2008 to have the same testing done each time. The insurance company paid the doctors $55,000 for more than 400 nonexistent procedures for the one patient alone.

Dr. Ali A. Al-Attar fled the United States after the indictment to avoid arrest and imprisonment and is now considered a fugitive from justice. Late in 2012 he was observed in Beirut Lebanon conversing with a Hezbollah official. Al-Attar is of interest in this case because he appears to have been a friend of Imran Awan and also loaned him $100,000, which was never repaid. The FBI is currently looking into any possible international espionage specifically involving the two men as Awan and his associates clearly had access to classified information while working in the House of Representatives that would have been of interest to any number of foreign governments.

The Imran Awan case is certainly of considerable interest not only for what the investigation eventually turns up but also for what it reveals about how things actually work in congress and in the government more generally speaking. I don’t know which of the allegations about what might have taken place are true, but there is certainly a lot to consider. Whether the case is investigated and prosecuted without fear or favor will depend on the Department of Justice and FBI, but I for one was appalled to learn that the official who quite likely will oversee the investigation of the Awans is one Steven Wasserman, Assistant Attorney for the District of Columbia, the brother of Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. If that should actually occur, it would be a huge conflict of interest and it has to be wondered if Wasserman would have the integrity to recuse himself."

"Peak White Man" (Dinh) (see also: "The bulk of “Operation Finale” is devoted to Eichmann’s abduction from Argentina, masterminded by the Mossad and encouraged by David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s founding prime minister." and "Abu Omar case"):

". . . Vietnam recently kidnapped a Vietnamese asylum seeker from the Tiergarten, right in the heart of Berlin, then smuggled him back to Hanoi to stand trial. A former head of the state-owned oil company, Trinh Xuan Thanh is accused of pinching $150 million."

Monday, August 07, 2017

"First Violent Attack Against Jazz Audience" (Atzmon). The levels of violence keep escalating, with the authorities, of course, too terrified to do anything about it.

"64 Years Later, CIA Details Long-Hidden Role in Iran Coup". Worth reading in light of what's going on in Venezuela right now. It is quaint to read about American interference with the goal of advancing American strategic/commercial interests, something you almost never see today, when interference is almost always done for the interests of another group.

"What’s It Like to See a Democracy Destroyed?" It is a useful exercise to watch the propaganda as it is being made!

"Kenya deports 1 American and 1 Canadian for election meddling". ""A-Bomb Kid"". You are probably naturally thinking Soros meddling, but it appears to be Google: "Aristotle" and "Shortlisted Premier Partners" (scroll down to Artistotle, Inc.).

"Modi revisits Iran ties" (Bhadrakumar). Despite all the clouds of rhetoric, it is funny how all the big commercial stuff - where oodles of money is made - always seems to get done. That's the magic behind the inevitability of China's Silk Road. There is a huge difference between the American imperial approach - do what we say or else - and the Chinese approach - do what we suggest and you'll get rich.

"Dershowitz and Chomsky agree on one thing". PTSD caused by the trauma of having some difficulty, fifty years ago, at getting a high academic job, now explains a lot.

Things have changed: "Another Columnist Fired for Mentioning Jews". "Pro-Israel advocates in Australia targeted three journalists, new book claims".

The subtleties of creating a propaganda background for land theft: "New York Times ignores Israeli calls for ethnic cleansing".

"How Serious Is The Possibility of a Constitutional Convention?" (Strether). Whatever you might think of the prospects of success, it seems clear that the Kochs are conspiring to bring this about.

More of the BuzzFeed Russia bashing (part of a series): ""Everyone thinks he was whacked"".

"A Blacklisted Film and the New Cold War" (Parry). Seeing how on point it is, it is curious how incurious the media is about seeing this film. The Daily Beast looks like shit here, outright lying.

"Personal life" of Bill Browder. Grandson of the leader of the Communist Party USA, whose father got a job at Brandeis when Eleanor Roosevelt vetoed the rest of the board who were afraid to hire the son of the former leader of the Communist Party USA. Years later, the father was awarded the National Medal of Science by President Clinton. Then the grandson ends up shit-disturbing in Russia. A well-connected family! I think I'm getting the picture.

"Dunkirk Backstory: Jewish Traitors, Communist Spies, and the Internment of Oswald Mosley’s Blackshirts" (Begbie). More lost history.

"Guy Who Accidentally Stopped WannaCry Ransomware Detained After Defcon". I have to say at the time I didn't believe any of the story about how this guy somehow stumbled on a switch on the internet he could simply turn off to stop the WannaCry attack.

"Blind Item #10". There is a strong whiff of mafia, probably the real reason for the firing rather than the Fox bimbo affair being floated as the reason.

Sunday, August 06, 2017

Hugo Chavez saw this big pile of oil money that the rich people would have normally just taken, naturally, as they do, and decided to give it to poor people. Btw, these poor people are poor because they are discriminated against on racial grounds (being indigenous, not European). Yeah, they could have been smarter on the central banking tricks, and some of their friends got rich in the way that happens when money is flying around, but the fact of the matter that they radically transformed the lives of millions of people. There is a spirit coming up from below that must not be allowed to be quashed to set an example of what is impossible. For armchair quarterbacks to criticize them for not being 'socialist' enough - when we're looking at one of the greatest real socialist events in human history! - is both bizarre and embarrassing for the critics. Maduro just wants to keep this going, in the face of massive resistance, backed up by the CIA and the worst American oil thieves, from a group that resembles what you would get if you ground up Pinochet and all the Argentinian and Brazilian generals, added 90% horseshit, and formed them into lumps in the shape of human beings. This isn't hard. As I've said here before, you have to pick the right people as your friends, and stick by them.

Speaking of which: ""The United States assassinated Pakistan's first PM, Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan, more than sixty years ago". " (Angry Arab).

Welsh is usually pretty good, but this is unfortunate (has 'the clarification' not been clarifying?):

"A Quick Note On Venezuela" (Welsh). "Against Chavez, and all heroes and great men." The people of Venezuela are up against all the money and power in Venezuela (except the army and the people), all the money and power in the world, and still stumble on, yet are insufficiently pure in their 'socialism' for the blogging commentariat, who seem quite pleased with themselves for suggesting to the poorest of the poor that they should just starve to death so the 'real' socialism can emerge. Anything short of the finest distillation of anarcho-socialist-syndicalist-bolshevik-leninism-maoism is doomed to fail, don't you know? It's Pol Pot, or fuck it! Why do these fools even try? As usual, the enemy of literally staying alive is the ivory tower platonic perfection of left-wing political science.

"Russian Sanctions Latest Betrayal of Post-Cold War Agreements" (Gunnar). Very useful summary that the latest sanctions are just part of a series of senseless provocations against Russia using NATO/nukes that has been going on for years.

"‘Vast stupidity’: Oliver Stone slams ‘dumb’ US sanctions against Russia". Good short introduction on the contradictions of Stone.

"Trump’s Objections to Russia Sanctions Law Suggest He Might Trade Crimea Away". Mackey is an outlier in Crazy Pierre's stable of propagandists. Lots going on here, including the consequences of failed lawfare. Comment by Sara.

"White House ‘Enemies List’ Drove McMaster-Bannon Feud". I'm guessing there is no actual feud, and this kayfabe is an attempt to create some space for Trump officials to do their work. It is telling that McMaster's problem as described by his critics is that he is insufficiently ass-kissing on Israel.

"Louise Mensch’s New Conspiracy: It Wasn’t the Russians; It Was the Jews". If you remove Putin she's come dangerously close to the truth.

"Inside Patreon, the economic engine of internet culture". I hate to always be the conspiracy nut, but how do you write all this about Patreon without mentioning the key fact?:

"Founded in 2013, Patreon has raised $47.1 million of investment capital - $30 million of which was led by venture firm Thrive Capital, co-owned and managed by Joshua Kushner - brother of President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner. Of note, Joshua and Jared co-founded real estate firm Cadre - which got of the ground with a $250 million line of credit from George Soros)."

"Haftar: Israeli secret aid to Libya's strongman reveals a new friend in Africa". This is either true or pure Israeli disinfo, and I don't know how you would tell which is which.

"The political motive behind football’s biggest transfer". Qatar's program of buying friends in high places seems to have worked to perfection.

"He’d sound less psychotic if he’d accidentally shaved off half his mustache in 2003 and kept it that way for the next twelve years just so he could claim he’d done it on purpose."

"Should Toronto push to decriminalize all drugs? The city’s medical health officer ready to consider it". I am always going to find it hilarious that the obvious and easy solution to all major problems is inevitably called 'impossible'. Think how often this excuse is given! Yet how could the 'experts' possibly know with absolutely no data to rely on?

". . . the EPA effectively declared Roundup safe for use without even conducting tests on the actual formulation, but instead relying on industry research on just one of the product's active ingredients."

'Ghost-write' the 'expert' conclusions that the toxic stew that is RoundUp is safe, for the paid-off scientists to sign. It is funny that glyphosate may be safe, but the surfactant used in RoundUp is a deadly carcinogen.

"Dumbo". The tragedy of air-gapping means you sometimes have to get physical access to computers, meaning you have to find a way to switch off treasonous security cameras.

"Google blocked every one of the WSWS’s 45 top search terms". It is striking how seriously the IC - in which we have to include
Google, Facebook, Amazon et al. - is now treating the dangers of internet-provided access to information as a threat to all that is holy and good.

Cambridge Analytica and Alistair MacWillson, who is somehow connected to every shady, spooky fuck you can imagine. What's with the two Cambridge Analyticas?

"It’s ka-ching for Jagmeet Singh as donors flock to stylish MPP: Walkom". "For NDP candidate Jagmeet Singh, it’s not all about the base". Trudeau still has full control of the besotted Canadian media, but there are problems starting to appear in his narrative (try not to gag, but note the stark environmental contradictions amongst the swooning), and I'm staring at a path to a Sikh prime minister, someone who can out-Trudeau Trudeau (but you've got to love Charlie Angus a lot, in the Corbyn-style 'real deal' authenticity mode).

"Neocons Leverage Trump-Hate for More Wars" (Parry). This whole piece should be carved in stone and erected around the United States.

"McMaster solidifies power at NSC — and supports Iran deal, sees Israel as occupier" (Weiss). Curious to watch the usual suspects display their cards so forcefully.

I think it would be wise to follow the General and start calling it the 'Occupying Power' rather than Israel.

"What’s Worse: Trump’s Campaign Agenda or Empowering Generals and CIA Operatives to Subvert it?" (Greenwald). Note the Kristol tweet. Things are getting hella-weird when Glick and Kristol are taking opposite sides. This seems to derive from contradictions in the perceived view of Bannon's political philosophy, which are the contradictions in nationalist interventionism (and, for that matter, contradictions in Zionism).

I think it curious that Bannon's whiteboard keeps finding its way into photographs, almost as if he wants to create the idea that we can see into what he is really thinking, but his concerns seem to be entirely taxes/trade. I think we should be particularly careful in letting Bannon define for us what Bannon really thinks.

If you are Trump (or Bannon), and you really don't think the country can afford to fight any more wars, but you face massive pressure from agents of the Occupying Power to do so, creating intentional ambiguity is a good strategy. Promote yourself as a warmonger, but somehow keep getting stymied in your efforts towards war. After all, any war is totally against MAGA and against the spirit of nationalist isolationism.

We probably need to go back to the autistic libertarianism that surrounds people like Mercer. They are focused on trade and taxes and immigration, are agnostic on war (which is 'irrational' but a possible money-maker in the right conditions), and don't give a shit about the Occupying Power unless they can use it as leverage for one of their three main preoccupations. Mercer got thrown in with hard-core Christian Zionists when he supported Cruz, but dropped Cruz as soon as it was apparent that Cruz couldn't deliver the Presidency. The basic premise of autistic libertarianism is that white American males run the world, and ought to run the world as they are intellectually superior, but need to have the shackles created by or for the benefit of inferior groups removed so they can achieve their destiny. Thus, end 'unfair' trade deals, eliminate taxation of the rich, and end/reverse immigration. War - the only real interest of the Occupying Power and its treason agents - serves as a political/legislative distraction from the main goals.

Good comment by G at Naked Capitalism on the mystery of Hersh. I don't share the optimism that this story could make it into the mainstream media. Some things are just too dangerously true to be seen. There is still not a mention of the Hersh tape anywhere that I can find in the mainstream media, which would be amazing if we didn't know how deeply dishonest the mainstream media is.

"Why We Can and Must End Our Greatest Crime" (Swanson). On American wars.

"Blair escapes prosecution for the invasion of Iraq. What now for accountability?" "Leaked Photos Link Corbyn To Known International Terrorist".

Friday, August 04, 2017

"How Donald Trump Threw Peace and Prosperity Under an AIPAC Bus" (Butler) (my emphasis in red - the only comparable unanimity comes in the regular support votes for Israel so it was odd, wasn't it?):

"Two days ago, a close colleague of mine was on the line from Greenwich, Connecticut to discuss my upcoming book when the conversation turned to these new Russia sanctions. My colleague related a story from Capital Hill and an insider who explained the vote on the sanctions law. The gist of this insider’s revelation was that the overwhelming “yes vote” in Congress indicated one powerful player behind the curtain – America’s pro-Israel lobby AIPAC.

When I heard AIPAC stood behind, my mind immediately reverted to images and sound bites of Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. Their mutual gratification society handshakes, the syrupy sweetness of the Israeli’s recollections on young Trump – and then I thought on the Saudi arms deal and the wider frame of the Arab Spring. Sorry to consolidate so many facets here, but if Trump and all of Washington has acquiesced totally to the will of AIPAC, then America is all done. Looking again at Russia’s Medvedev:

“Trump’s administration has demonstrated total impotence by surrendering its executive authority to Congress in the most humiliating way.”

The point of this new sanctions law is revealed simply. If AIPAC controls the Unites States Congress, and if the President of the United States has surrendered his executive authority to that body, then the Israeli lobby controls the Government of the United States – lock stock and barrel. In other words, a foreign sovereign nation and ideology rules America – and it rules it with impunity."

"‘Disappointed’ AIPAC targets Gillibrand for removing her name from boycott bill".